In a belated companion to my nearly year-old discussion regarding the Hudsons of the Ypsilanti Automotive Heritage Museum, here is the follow-up: the Ypsilanti collection of Chevrolet Corvairs. Because the Corvair was assembled at the nearby Willow Run factory, Ypsilanti is in some ways its spiritual home. Contrary to what people who tell Ralph Nader jokes will have you believe, the Corvair was relatively successful with roughly 1.5 million of them sold. The museum has five of them.
Here was Chevy’s initial interpretation of the Corvair, the 1960 model, a Volkswagen-inspired economy car. It’s still vaguely invigorating that a conservative corporate monolith like General Motors would sign off on such a thing, but here it is, the car whose design inspired so many imitators everywhere but here.
Unfortunately, the Corvair did not succeed as well as Chevrolet had hoped, although more than 250,000 were sold in the first model year. Here is the spartan interior and bench seat of that first-year Corvair. It was roomy for a compact with its flat floor, but more buyers preferred the Falcon, which must have given Ford some schadenfreude.
There is a surprising number of small differences between the 1960 Corvair and the 1961 Corvair: The engine was even five cubic inches larger for 1961 (145 vs. 140 cubic inches).
Photo posted by the New Hampshire Corvair Club.
The earliest 1960 models are sometimes called “horn slot” cars, because they had three little slots in the valance. These were eliminated early on in the production run.
The Corvair found its footing with the introduction of the Monza in the middle of the 1960 model year: This sporty 1964 Monza coupe is a good representation of the average Corvair in the mid 1960s.
The Monza’s interior is what made it the success it was. With bucket seats and a floor-shifted four-speed stick, the Corvair lived up to its vaguely sporting pretensions. No longer a strictly no-frills economy car, the Corvair Monza appealed to a different sort of buyer.
The 1964 model was the last of what Corvair fans call the “EM,” which simply stands for “Early Model.” It is also a bridge between the two generations of Corvair, with a camber compensating spring to help tame the rear swing axles and a larger 164-cubic-inch flat-six (up from 145 cubic inches).
In 1962, the engine that most people remember when they think of Corvairs was introduced: the turbocharged “Monza Spyder” (“Corsa” starting in 1965) engine. Here’s an example of a 1965/1966 turbocharged 164 (you can tell by the sticker on the air cleaner – later versions had 180 horsepower rather than 150). The pre-1965 turbocharged engine would have also had a generator rather than an alternator.
The museum had two 1969 models when we visited, including this blue coupe. The basic drivetrain layout of the Corvair stayed the same for its entire run, but the LM (Late Model) Corvair had an entirely new suspension in 1965, eliminating the swing axles that were to become so controversial. Notice the air pump on this car. Making the Corvair meet increasingly stringent emission standards would have been expensive had they decided to continue producing it, which was another reason that the Corvair didn’t survive into the 1970s.
It’s been well-documented here that the Mustang and its mechanically-simple-yet-sporty formula was the real reason for the Corvair’s demise. It’s also well-documented that Corvair development was drastically curtailed before Ralph Nader’s book even came out. If anything, it is unlikely that there would have been a 1967-1969 Corvair without Ralph Nader – the Camaro would have simply taken its place and a few diehards would have been sad about the loss of their favorite car.
I still dream of finding the last Corvair – number 6000 – in a barn somewhere, but that’s not going to happen. It was never titled and there’s no evidence that it still exists. Rumors say that it was crushed, but nobody knows (or at least nobody has come forward to say for certain). What we do know is that exactly 6000 Corvairs were mostly hand-built on a separate Willow Run assembly line in 1969. This convertible, which belongs to a very nice volunteer at the museum, was one of them.
There were few updates for the late Corvairs, including a more heavily padded dashboard and high-backed bucket seats. This example is painted in one of my favorite colors for Corvairs, Fathom Green.
As a Corvair owner myself, I have a love-hate relationship with them, largely because I bought a poor example. Here’s a picture of mine as I was repairing the rusted rocker panels, an important and very heavily built part of the convertible Corvair.
Here’s the engine torn apart for re-ringing and clutch replacement. I’ve had the drivetrain out of mine about four times in the sixteen years I’ve owned it, primarily due to my learning the car’s eccentricities along the way.
Although I enjoy working on my cars, the Corvair is a car that is affordable enough that you should buy a good one. I still kick myself for not selling mine when a good maroon Corsa convertible came up for sale locally about six months after I bought it, but that’s not the car’s fault.
The Corvair is fun to drive, and although I’m not as passionate about them as the true fanatics (they say you can’t own just one, but I’m proof that you can), they are an exciting part of General Motors history. If you can stand the Ralph Nader jokes, you could do a lot worse in the collector car world. If you’re looking for a fun way to pass a few hours while you’re in the Ypsilanti area, you could also do a lot worse than visiting the Ypsilanti Automotive Heritage Museum.
At one time I had a 1965 Corvair convertible, that I had installed a “Crown” V-8 conversion (a 327 in the back seat area.). About 5 years ago I saw a late model Corvair that I thought was very unusual, at my grandsons house. It was in poor condition, but was a convertible with GM factory air conditioning. I have no idea what ever happened to the car.
A factory air-conditioned convertible must have been one of only a few. I’m very glad mine doesn’t have air; the various trinkets take up a lot of space in the engine compartment.
The Corvair was the height of my childhood at Hallman’s Chevrolet and will always be the vintage Chevy I’d most prefer to own (unfortunately, vintage motorcycles got in the way). Well, I did have my “own” Corvair back when they were new. During the summer of 1965 my father, knowing his days at the dealership were numbered (which I didn’t), slipped home a maroon Monza two door with Powerglide for a couple of weeks, tossed me the keys, and looked the other way when I slipped it out the driveway for some quiet drives thru the neighborhood.
I was all of 15 at the time. I’d been ‘driving’ since I was twelve (Renault Dauphine automatic), and the hard and fast rules were I was not allowed to go onto the two main roads (Goucher St. and Menoher Blvd., both with 35mph speed limits) that bordered our general neighborhood, keeping it to the local 25mph streets – and stay within the speed limit. Oh yeah, and one trip a day, preferably in the morning after all the adults had left for work. Happily, nobody ever notified the police.
It was a nice five weeks. Three months later dad was out of the dealership and my childhood essentially fell apart.
The Corvair is, and always will be in my mind, the greatest car General Motors ever made.
Over 20 years ago, there was an older guy down the street from my parents who regularly drove a maroon ’65 Monza with a Powerglide. He’d regularly leave it parked in the street like it was no big thing. It was a few years before I decided I wanted a Corvair, so I didn’t appreciate it’s being around like I should have, but I would now.
Thanks for the look in to the Corvair world. Loved my 65 Monza convertible. Purchased back in 2000 and restored by me, it was a great handling, stylish automobile. Sold it in 2009 but now my 18 year old son is rebuilding the engine on a friend’s 66 Corsa! It never ends
You’re welcome! Parts are still available, and there’s a lot of owner support online if there are any questions, which is nice.
I agree with your nicely-phrased quip that it is “still vaguely invigorating that corporate monolith like GM would sign off on such a thing” as the Corvair: perhaps the car raises some wishful hope that the great old monolith of yore, and all the nostalgia we associate with its peak, might one day surprise us all again. For the sheer fact of the car trying harder than, say, leaf springs and conventional layouts, I’ll remain intrigued by the Corvair.
And, of course, there’s those famously-influential looks, which intrigue me most of all, because I’m never quite decided if the first Corvair is actually a good-looking car. I like it, but suspect my view is colored by the interest in the engineering beneath. (The second-gen 4-door is an out and out stunner, no quibbles). Not only that, could it really be said that the many derivations from the theme of the ’60 are themselves especially pretty? Many plainly aren’t, like the NSU Prinz, or the Karmann Ghia Type (4?), or the Hilman Imp. But there is also the shark-nosed BMW coupe, which is very liked by most when the sharkiest bits were facelifted away, though I personally still think the 1602/2002 is a fairly severe-looking device. I say all this because surely the looks of the Corvair were a factor in its comparative low sales next to the conventional Falcon? I reckon just even a fake grille might’ve made a difference. I wonder.
The issue of the Corvair’s styling has been one that I’ve spent way too much time on in my life, ever since seeing them in Iowa City in 1960. And as a former owner of a ’63 Monza 4-door, I had plenty of even deeper immersion, but the questions you raise I too have struggled with all these decades.
As I’ve pointed out here before, the ability to make the Corvair very low allowed the stylists to give it basic proportions closer to a full size car than its RWD competitors, which all looked rather tall, short and stubby in comparison. That really did enhance its attractiveness, but that was of course impossible to translate to all those Corvair imitators in Europe. It’s a bit like a short and plump woman wearing a couturier gown designed for a tall and willowy model. I think the Europeans failed to appreciate that element, although I guess the BMW coupe doesn’t so much suffer from that issue. But the 1602/2002 most certainly does, along with many/most of the rest.
The gen1 Corvair needs to be seen (and appreciated) from that perspective. In essence it was an idealized American car; the familiar proportions including the flying wing rood on the four doors, taken straight from the 1959 big cars, but utterly sanitized in its lack of all the affectations that typified American cars of the time. I can see why the Europeans loved it: A much better American car!
And that was its appeal to those that liked and bought it in the US: folks that were tired of the overly large and trinket-laden American big car. But it also didn’t look stubby like most imports at the time either. It was a hybrid, in essence. And it deserves the accolades inasmuch as no one had done that before.
As to the gen2 Corvair: There’s no question in my mind that the coupe is a gem. But I have never been able to warm up to the 4-door; it looks way too much like a ’66 Chevelle 4-door in profile. It just doesn’t work for me, whereas I am perpetually torn as to whether I prefer the gen1 coupe or 4-door sedan more. They both have a lot of appeal to me.
No disrespect to Aaron’s convertible, but I can’t even muster much enthusiasm for the gen2 convertible, because of the way it looks with the top up. Too much like a small scale Chevelle.
In essence, the gen2 works only as a coupe for me, and the reason is its airy roof. Frankly, the rest of the body is of course very much in the 1965 GM idiom. If it had gotten a fatter C-pillar like the rest of the ’65-’66 GM cars, I probably would like it even less.
In summary: whereas the gen2 coupe is undeniably beautiful, by 1965 its rear engine proportions (short hood-long tail) didn’t look contemporary anymore, and thus it didn’t have the significant impact of the gen1, whose proportions were utterly new and eye-opening. Nothing like it had been seen before, and that aspect is why I place the Gen1 on a higher pedestal. It’s not just the gown alone that makes the car (or woman); it’s also the ability to shock us out of our familiarity, or safe zone, and say Wow; I didn’t think that such a thing was possible!
As a tall person, did the car’s lack of height bother you in practice? Even when young, I wasn’t keen on folding up that much just for appearances. GM was probably afraid of losing even more big car sales if they gave their small ones adequate room.
The interior room in the Corvair was perfectly adequate. From a Motor Life review (link below):
“The Corvair’s (interior) capacity in one of its happiest assets. It is the lowest American car on the outside yet it has the most interior headroom, bar none.(!!) Foot room, front and rear is quite good and the nearly flat floor makes the packing of more than four passengers into the car possible, if not too comfortable.”
I can’t vouch for their claim of it having “the most interior headroom bar none”, but it very much was not cramped. Keep in mind that the Y-Bodies (Tempest, Special, F-85) used the same basic body shell, but the Corvair was even roomier then those due to the flat floor.
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/vintage-reviews/vintage-motor-life-review-1960-chevrolet-corvair-part-1-of-a-three-car-comparison/
I agree that there’s plenty of headroom in a Corvair, although I did build some seat extenders for three inches more legroom. I’m six feet tall, and this is a common modification.
Regarding the looks of the EM vs. the LM, I like your analysis, Paul, even if I’m on the other side of the fence. The original was out of nowhere, but I prefer the later ones because they are styled in the mid-’60s GM idiom. Looking like a Chevelle isn’t a bad thing to me.
I listened to GM styling chief Bill Porter give a talk at a local art museum in 2009, and he felt that the ’65 Corvair four-door was one of the most beautiful cars ever designed (he was not responsible for it). It was interesting to hear him talk about why he felt that way – he brought up the wide rear pillar and its proportions in comparison to the placement of the wheels from a side view. It’s certainly a very clean design, even if it’s more innocuous than the ’60.
Justy, that’s a great point about the grille. I remember reading somewhere that many people found the lack of a grille odd. When I bought mine in 2007, one of my coworkers (a woman who probably graduated from high school in the late-’60s or early ’70s) asked “Where’s the radiator grille?”
As far as the EMs go, I’d much prefer a sedan to the coupe (unless the coupe were a Fitch Sprint).
It’s impossible to argue against the obvious beauty of the gen2, sedan included. My comments are more based on the impact they made on me personally. It’s probably harder for me to be objective because I was there when it first came out. By 1965, the Corvair was a familiar sight, and the gen2 a more beautiful one, but it lacked the newness and impact of the gen1.
The reality is, perhaps unfortunately, by 1965 folks eyes had moved on, to the Mustang, Sting Ray, ‘the ’65 GM cars, etc.. Most Americans were not really attuned to its existance anymore by then. It had become an aficionado’s car. Everyone was very much aware of the gen1 in its first few years.
Yeah, I’d love one of these. I believe Road & Track tested one that was gold with red stripes (black and white photos) that would be perfect.
Very much my own way of thinking, Paul. To my mind the first gen Sedan and 2nd gen Coupe are the best looking of the breed – that beautiful greenhouse makes the coupe whereas on the first gen coupe the roof seems a little short. The gen 2 four door is very generic, as you stated. The Lakewood was neat looking, as were the Greenbrier and Rampsides.
The thing that struck me about riding in a Corvair and Greenbrier was how modern the ride seemed, how tight the structure was and how refined they felt – very different to BOF sedans, or those unibodies with live rear axles.
A 2nd gen coupe is definitely one of my “bucket list” cars.
It’s been said before that the Corvair ate Renault’s (and the more marginal imports’) lunch while the Falcon stole sales from the full-size Ford. On the other hand, Ford could console themselves that most of the buyers moving to Falcon would’ve gone for low-margin Custom 300s while their lead in high-profit station wagons and convertibles was undiminshed.
I’ve been there (at a CC Meet-Up) and it’s a great spot for deep Corvair contemplation and/or veneration.
It was there that I became reacquainted with the modular gen2 engine that could be built in everything from 4 to 10 cylinders(!):
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/automotive-histories/engine-prototype-the-stillborn-corvair-gen2-modular-engine-from-two-to-twelve-cylinders/
It was also there that I finally figured out the significant changes for 1961, including the addition of a standard hot air heating system (the 1960 only had a gas fired heater):
https://www.curbsideclassic.com/automotive-histories/automotive-history-corvair-cold-comfort-heating-optional-1960-1961-your-choice-of-gasoline-or-engine-heat/
BTW, the coupe was essentially a 1960.5 model as it didn’t arrive until January of that year. It was quite uncommon to see them back in the day. There was a Monza version in our neighborhood that I used to peruse on my mile-long trudge to school in Iowa City.
The 1960 2-door coupe was brought out in January of 1960 as a 500 or 700 model. The white coupe in the Museum is a 700 model with just over 6,700 miles on it since new!. The sporty Monza coupe didn’t show up ’till May of ’60 and less than 20,000 of them were produced.
Great article! I have developed a great appreciation for Corvairs thanks to CC.
Thank you Dave!
You mentioned the original “horn slot” models. Can I assume the reason for them was that’s where the horn was located?
That is correct. For the later cars like mine, the horns were mounted behind the left headlight. Just a few years ago, I decided to get to the bottom of my “one-note horn,” and found one of the horns just lying in the headlight cutout. A quick reattachment and all was well.
The original design located the horn(s) below the front bumper. The reason for the slots in the lower panel was to allow the horn to project volume out in front of the car. In testing it was found that yes, the noise went out front but road debris also came back in and plugged up the slots and the horn itself.Oooops!
Our “71 VW fstback” had a tube like thing in that spot. Was for the horn as well. When the winter “yuck” of wstrn PA froze on it; no horn..
That engine in the picture is not a turbo charged engine. The turbo air decal does not mean turbo charged.
He’s referring to the obviously turbocharged engine above his text. Our convention is to show the picture first, and then the corresponding text below it.
You are so right! Please accept my apology!
The turbocharged display engine isn’t really turbocharged at all! It is an empty shell of an engine for display only. It does have all of the correct turbo bits for show.
Looking up the specs I see that they called the original 1960 engine “Turbo Air.” Kind of like Chrysler products had Torsion-aire front suspension that featured no air. Not even not invented yet (probably) air shocks. I think their copywriters were trying to compete with optional air suspensions brought out by Ford and GM in 1958, then quickly dropped with most of them converted to regular springs.
Oddly, there weren’t any production actual turbocharged engines either yet.
Man, I wish I had some decent photos of the Corvair that my parents bought in October 1959. I imagine it was probably one of the “horn slot” cars, but it would be fun to know for sure. Thanks for the great photos.
You’re welcome! If it was built in September, it could very well have been a horn slot car. That would be a great find today because there are so few left.
There are only 4 or 5 of the 1960 “Horn Slot” Corvairs known to have survived as of today. The black sedan in the Museum is one of them. It is the 375th Corvair built at the Willow Run plant back in July of 1959. By the end of the second or third week of July ’59 the unique front panels with the slots were used up so no more horn slot cars. All 1960’s had the horns mounted up under the headlight buckets. The design change was made after about 500 panels were pressed out with the slots. Rather than scrap the metal pieces the first Corvairs off the line were fitted with these panels. Very rare today to find one!
Thank you for all the information about the museum Corvairs, Pete! I can’t believe that I didn’t notice that the black ’60 was a horn slot car! I think that I had a hard time getting a picture of it, so I must have not looked carefully at the front end.
And thank you also for the information on the horn location of the 1960 models and the timeline on the horn slot panels. I’ve read a lot of your posts over on Corvair Center and you’re a true expert on Corvairs.
If that “blue, looker” in the final pic had “spinner wheel covers”..could be Darrin/ Samantha Stephen’s car!
Been a “Corvair” lover forever!
That lucky pair had a Corsa!
The “so called, young couple” that buys the cabin in this episode arrived in a spiffy “59 Chevy”.
Back then a lot of TV series featured cars mostly all from the same company.
Coincidence, probably.
Aaron, I dropped by only to say I really enjoyed this, and now I may need to check out this museum myself. It does occur to me that even though the first and second generation ‘Vair look so vastly different from each other, they’re still totally identifiable as generations of the same model. Aside from the grille-less front ends and round taillamps, I have often wondered why that is…
Thanks Joe, I think you’d like the museum. It’s small but worth visiting if you’re in the area. My wife and I sometimes make a side trip to Zingerman’s in Ann Arbor and make a day of it. 🙂
It’s too bad there wasn’t a third-gen Corvair so we could see how they would have handled the car’s styling continuity into the ’70s.
We bought a 1960 Corvair from my brother-in-law for my mom, needless to say when I got my license it kinda turned into my car. I read up on Fitch Sprints and Yenko Corvairs and after driving a 65 Corvair Fitch Sprint I decided Corvair Corsas would be my car. I bought 65, upgrades suspension and eventually rebuilt the engine with a hot cam, the lunar landing module 4brl manifold and headers. The car run damn good! I even bought a 62 Corvair windo van, not a Greebriar, that was converted to camper with full pop up, it was awesome. My last Corvair was a 66 Corsa I had for 22 years. Lots of fond memories running EMPI VWs, 180hp turbo Corsas, small block Chevys and 225 hp Mustangs and lastly the 240z. While the 60 would try to tail swap the Corsas were awesome road cars.
Looked up the specs. Despite being three inches lower than a Falcon they had about the same head room front and rear (four door only, of course). The Falcon had a half inch more front legroom and three inches more rear leg room though – higher seats probably. And five and a half cubic feet more total interior room. The Corvair claims more trunk room, but it’s in two parts. I assume there was VW Beetle-like space behind the back seat. If you chose a Valiant you got interior room about the same as a Falcon in an inch lower car, and enough gears in the automatic transmission.
First car was a 1963 4 door white corvair, year 1971 bought for 200 bucks .fun car , wish I still had it
A 65 red corvair convertible with my beautiful red head girlfriend. Heaven in earth. 4 classmates had Corvairs..we were The Corvair Boys! Greatest time of my life
Almost as soon as the Corvair was introduced, its engine made its way onto experimental aircraft. I own a Corvair powered airplane. The picture shows one (not mine) where a Ford Model A engine was used previously, a big improvement.
I’m intrigued with flying in one as a passenger. Yours sounds like the Aircamper model.
The one pictured is an Aircamper, chosen to illustrate an early Corvair installation. The picture below is my Zenith, with a much more recent Corvair installation.
Nice looking plane! It makes sense that the Corvair engine would be used in aircraft – they’re a (once) plentiful, reasonably powerful air-cooled engine. I’ve never looked into them – are there any changes from the automotive version?
Quite a few changes. Single updraft aircraft carb, high lift low rpm cam, fan and shrouding removed and replaced with traditional aircraft ram air cooling, different starter and alternator arrangement, additional main bearing to support prop extension shaft, and others. Still, a small six runs so much smoother than a traditional big four aircraft engine of the same hp and at less than half the cost.
Hi Aaron. Check this out. https://flycorvair.net/
I had no idea Corvair engines were still a popular choice for aircraft; it looks like they’re even building new cranks for them. If you keep them in their operating parameters, they should run forever. The only thing that would bother me is the possibility of a dropped valve seat, but the flycorvair.net website said that five cylinders is enough to fly on.
Something else I learned: It doesn’t take that much power to keep a small plane in the air. A hundred horsepower or so is all it takes.
Gosh, that 69 convertible in the article sure looks like the one I owned from 1976 into the 1980s. I lived in Novi, Michigan when I sold it, which is not far from Ypsilanti. It was a very late 69 model and the workmanship was a bit poor. The underside of the front hood was actually painted without primer.
Chevrolet had such a hard time selling the ’69 Corvair that it gave out a $150 rebate on the buyer’s next Chevrolet when they sold the remaining stock near the end of the production run. I’ve heard that the 1969s weren’t put together all that well.
I remember when I was in college that a student used to drive a Corvar and I thought it was really neat. That’s been over 45 years ago.
In addition to being interesting, I liked it because Ralph Nader’s opinion was being debunked and how best better to support something that was looked down upon by the globalists?
I would be happy to buy a convertible today for fun driving.
Corvairs (including convertibles) are still relatively affordable. You can get a nice convertible for under $15,000 – just do a careful check for rust. Look at the bottom of the A-Pillars where the door latches are attached. If you see bubbling or holes, move on to the next one. Take a magnet for the rockers.
Early? Late? 4door Sport Sedan? Convertibles? Spyders? Rampside? CORSA? Fitch Sprint (LM)? I’ve got ’em all!
Here’s a Google cloud link to a few… even a Corvair 140hp 4 carb “Mid Engine” in my survivor ’65 Grand Prix
https://photos.app.goo.gl/787dRV9gYSid5Ns37
I collect ’em all… 409s, Cadillacs, BMW (a V12 driven across the country towing an EM Monza from a junkyard in NM)
https://photos.app.goo.gl/m4vGeQsgVxzd4XJ3A
https://photos.app.goo.gl/z9ZSCwAq4QT6MiAX8
Just purchased MoreDoor 4 speed factory original paint…
https://photos.app.goo.gl/kSNfcG6NaTaAEX9d9
https://photos.app.goo.gl/UtPX7bQjXg6jzB5b7